Culture & Creativity

It's that time of year again. The endless array of comedic talent at Melbourne's International Comedy Festival is always a little overwhelming, so here's our round-up of the most justifiably hyped (and a few of the most underrated) female acts to catch in 2018.

Jacinta Parsons, along with co-host Sami Shah, will be replacing Red Symons in the iconic ABC Melbourne breakfast slot this year. We took five with Parsons, who started her career at Melbourne community radio station 3RRR before joining the ABC in 2015.

Matriarchy, feminist futurism, sisterhood, and subverting the patriarchy from an Indigenous woman’s standpoint. Those are just a handful of themes touched on by the exhibition RECENTRE:sisters, curated by Kimberley Moulton, (Senior Curator, Southeastern Australia Aboriginal Collections for Museums Victoria) and showing as part of theYIRRAMBOI First Nations Arts Festival in Melbourne.

If you grew up in the ’90s in Australia, there’s a good chance Simon Burke was either your first crush or your fantasy best bff as a five-year-old. We spoke to Sydney-based Burke, who remains active in films, television and theatre (and most recently featured in Noises Off with Queensland Theatre), about his work on the iconic children’s TV show.

Writer and performer behind Black Honey Company, Hot Brown Honey, and new play One the Bear opens up about white supremacy in the Australian theatre industry and creating work for the next generation of young queens of colour.

Aussie-born novelist Georgia Clark lives in New York and writes about feisty, flawed, funny women. We spoke to her about her new book The Regulars, which has been described as “a Dorian Gray for the Girls generation”.

Amy Shark has had quite the year. From doing pub gigs to coming second in Triple J’s Hottest 100 last year with her song “Adore” (which has 25 million streams on Spotify), we chatted with the Gold Coast-raised indie singer-songwriter and producer, who’s up for six ARIA awards (NBD) including Best Female Artist.